Summative assessments provide data to evaluate the effectiveness of schools, teachers, and educational policies, contributing to a robust accountability system worldwide. However, educators and scholars argue that summative assessments do not effectively promote ongoing learning, enhance teaching practices, or align with the skills required in the…

PREPARE, implemented by High Point University, was a Teacher Quality Partnership grant offering a Master of Education for elementary education, secondary mathematics, and special education (in grant years 2-5). The residency model included a living wage stipend to support time spent earning the accelerated master's degree. The PREPARE impact…

Causal-formative indicators are often used in social science research. To achieve identification in causal-formative indicator modeling, constraints need to be applied. A conventional method is to constrain the weight of a formative indicator to be 1. The selection of which indicator to have the fixed weight, however, may influence statistical…

Platform-enabled research services will control, manage, and measure learner experiences within that platform. In this paper, we consider the need for research services that examine learner experiences "outside" the platform. For example, we describe an effort to conduct an experiment on peer assessment in a college writing course, where…

This full paper concerns the use of gesture analysis to guide instructional approaches in engineering education. Engineering is rife with abstract mathematics and processes for quantifying physical phenomena. In engineering instruction, "formalisms first" is a practice that privileges formalisms over grounded and applied ways of knowing…

Cognitive Diagnosis Models (CDMs) are a special family of discrete latent variable models that are widely used in educational and psychological measurement. A key component of CDMs is the Q-matrix characterizing the dependence structure between the items and the latent attributes. Additionally, researchers also assume in many applications certain…

Regression discontinuity (RD) designs are increasingly used for causal evaluations. For example, if a student's need for a literacy intervention is determined by a low score on a past performance indicator and that intervention is provided to all students who fall below a cutoff on that indicator, an RD study can determine the intervention's main…

Increased expectations for writing performance have created a need for formative writing assessments that will help middle school teachers better understand adolescents' grade appropriate writing skills and monitor the progress of students with or at risk for writing disabilities. In this practice piece, we first explain research-based…

Interventions for youth are often studied in school settings, yet there are barriers that hinder schools from actively participating in the research studies. To ensure interventions are studied in the context they are intended for, adopted in a timely manner, and regularly used in practice as designed, researchers can conduct studies in a manner…

Background: Researchers interested in quantitative measures of student "success" in writing cannot control completely for contextual factors which are local and site-based (i.e., in context of a specific instructor's writing classroom at a specific institution). (In)ability to control for curriculum in studies of student writing…

We propose a framework designed to guide the development of automated writing practice and formative evaluation and feedback for young children (K-5 th grade) -- the early Automated Writing Evaluation (early-AWE) Framework. e-AWE is grounded on the fundamental assumption that e-AWE is needed for young developing readers, but must incorporate…

Automated Writing Evaluation systems have been developed to help students improve their writing skills through the automated delivery of both summative and formative feedback. These systems have demonstrated strong potential in a variety of educational contexts; however, they remain limited in their personalization and scope. The purpose of the…

Empirical evidence on the effectiveness of performance-based rewards for teachers is primarily based on the evaluation of monetary reward schemes. We present results from a randomized evaluation of a teacher and principal incentive programme in India that offered a non-pecuniary recognition reward based on students' test scores on standardized…

Stealth assessment is intended to not only measure important competencies, but also to support their development during gameplay or within other types of immersive learning environments. It uses evidence-centered assessment design to create the models (Mislevy, Steinberg, and Almond 2003), in conjunction with a statistical scoring and accumulation…

Paraprofessionals have become a significant portion of the educational workforce for students with or at risk for needing, or receiving special educational services. Although best practice and federal legislation require supervision of paraprofessionals by certified professional educators, research indicates that supervision rendered to…